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Jungkook hadn’t expected to end up here. He had just wanted some bubble tea.
If he was being honest with himself, though, the predicament was several weeks in the making. He had done the research, and he knew exactly what he needed to maximize the impact on his ever-growing Instagram following. The hard part, however, was overcoming social anxiety and general human shame long enough to walk into a vape shop and actually purchase a starter kit.
Thus, Jungkook found himself standing on the sidewalk between his favorite boba place and the vape shop next door, contemplating whether or not reviving his nicotine addiction was worth thirty dollars. The answer to that was an obvious no, but he wasn’t in it for the high. He was in it for the potential Instagram fans he could reel in, and he had been stuck at nine hundred and fifty thousand followers for so long.
A short burst of courage propelled him down the sidewalk and through the doors of the vape shop before he could think twice about it. He instantly, totally regretted it.
He had been anticipating some thirty-five year old, average-looking dude to be working behind the counter, maybe with a neckbeard and an anime t-shirt, someone who Jungkook could unapologetically flex on with his Boyish Good Looks, which would in turn make the entire experience far easier to live through. When he walked in, however, the counter was vacant, and he immediately began to wonder if the store was actually closed and he had just made an obnoxious mistake. A moment later, a worker appeared from the back of the store, and Jungkook silently prayed for God to choose that exact moment to finally smite him for all the sins he had committed in his young life.
The employee was hot in the way that people usually told Jungkook he was hot, meaning he was so attractive that every single one of his features was instantly burned into Jungkook’s mind. He was short, almost petite, and a little lanky. A tattoo on his chest peeked out from beneath the collar of his plain black t-shirt, his jeans hanging from his hip bones and making him look even skinnier than he was. His hair was dyed silver, and Jungkook almost melted into a puddle on the ground at how good the color looked on him, somehow so complimentary to his astonishingly pale skin.
“Can I help y–” The guy started, but Jungkook had already spun on his heel and run back out the door.
It wasn’t his proudest moment, but some primal instinct had spurred Jungkook to flee in terror, an instinct which did not subside until he was almost halfway back to his apartment and realized he was still sprinting like his life depended on it. He slowed to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk, catching his breath and coming to terms with his own stupidity.
“Jungkook, you dumbass,” he muttered to himself, only to have Jimin say the same exact words to him when he had gotten home and told his roommates the story.
“And you didn’t even get me boba,” Jimin added, shaking his head sadly. “You fucking disaster.”
Jungkook didn’t disagree. He was sitting at the table in their kitchen, Jimin across from him and Namjoon leaning against the counter.
“I didn’t know what to do!” Jungkook whined, burying his head in his arms. “I wasn’t about to buy a vape pen from a Greek god.”
“Why do you need one anyway?” Namjoon asked, taking a seat at the table with them. “I thought we as a society decided smoking wasn’t cool anymore.”
Before Jungkook could answer, Jimin cut in. “It’s not about actually vaping, it’s about the business model. Jungkook posts a pic of himself blowing a cloud? Boom. Fifty-thousand more followers overnight.”
Namjoon looked at Jungkook skeptically. “Didn’t you just kick your smoking habit? For your voice?”
Jungkook shrugged. “Vaping is healthier. It’s just like...water.” He looked to Jimin. “Right?”
Jimin took a noncommittal sip of coffee. “Whatever helps you sleep at night, kid.”
Namjoon looked unconvinced. “If it’s so important for your follower count, why aren’t you getting one, Jimin?”
Jimin sighed, holding up his hands as though pointing to a diagram that didn’t actually exist. “My brand is all about dancing and fitness and partially my looks, but Jungkook’s is all about his looks–”
“Hey!” Jungkook interrupted. “I sing, too!”
“Sure, whatever. He sings, too. But he’s got this whole bad boy aesthetic going and the vape would just add a whole new dimension.”
“But he’s not a bad boy,” Namjoon argued. “He cried when we watched Bambi last week.”
“Okay, but Instagram doesn’t need to know that.”
Namjoon eyed Jimin warily. “You’re giving me a real Kris Jenner vibe right now.”
Jimin clasped Namjoon’s hands with his own, close to tearing up. “I am so proud of you for actually knowing who that is. This is a big step for you.” He turned his attention back to Jungkook. “So you’re going back to get that vape, right?”
Jungkook chewed the last of his boba dejectedly. “I just humiliated myself in front of the hottest guy I’ve ever seen at the only vape shop in a ten mile radius. So, no.”
Immediately, Jimin stood up, knocked the empty boba cup off the table, and flicked Jungkook’s forehead. “Don’t be a bitch. Hot dude probably won’t even be there tomorrow. You’re going to march your cute little ass back there after class and buy a vape pen or I’ll hack your account and post a bunch of nudes.”
“That’s sexual harassment!” Jungkook argued, rubbing the red spot forming on his forehead.
“Who said they’ll be your nudes?” With that, Jimin took his mug and left Jungkook and Namjoon alone in the kitchen. Jungkook buried his head in his arms again.
“He’s so hot,” he whined through the sleeves of his hoodie. “He’s so hot and now he thinks I’m so lame.”
“You know he probably won’t remember you, right?” Namjoon pointed out. “He’s not going to give a shit.”
Jungkook lifted his head up. “Do you think I’m hot?”
Namjoon raised an eyebrow, clearly confused. “I mean, yeah, but I also knew you before you were potty-trained, so like–”
“That’s not the question. Am I hot?”
Namjoon sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Yes, Jungkook. You are objectively hot.”
“Please define my hotness.”
“I would genuinely rather die than do that. What are you trying to say?”
Jungkook slammed his hands on the table emphatically. Namjoon didn’t flinch. “Vape shop dude was the kind of hot that sears itself in your mind and refuses to be forgotten, which is also my exact brand of hotness. If we interact again the world as we know it may come to an end.”
“So humble,” Namjoon said flatly, rising from the table. “Listen, I don’t really care about what happens with all of this, but if it ends up being anything like Jimin and his fucking Starbucks barista, I’m not paying rent next month.”
“You’re so mean to me!” Jungkook shouted after him, but he was already gone.
The next day, Jungkook was sitting in one of the cafes on campus, eating a sad little sandwich and trying to finish a calculus problem set until Jimin and Seokjin slid into the empty chairs across from him. For a moment, he succeeded at ignoring them, but then Seokjin reached over and popped his headphones out of his ears and his concentration went completely to shit. He sighed and tossed his pencil down, irritation clear on his face as he looked up at them.
“Can I help you?”
Seokjin clasped his hands together and looked Jungkook up and down. “My informant tells me you had a moment of gay panic in a vape shop.”
“Your informant hates coffee but has been going to Starbucks every day for the past month because he wants to suck the barista’s dick,” Jungkook countered coolly.
“Objection!” Jimin interjected. “I don’t go on weekends anymore.”
“Because you found out he doesn’t work weekends anymore!”
“How the fuck would you know that?”
“Because I fucking like coffee so I fucking go to Starbucks!”
“At least I would’ve walked out of that shop with either a vape pen or a dick appointment!”
There was a moment of silence between them. Seokjin’s eyes, bemused, flitted from Jimin, to Jungkook, then back to Jimin.
“As entertaining as this is,” he cut in, “people are staring.” He turned his attention to Jungkook. “You’re going back, right?”
“I don’t know…” Jungkook chewed his lip. “Do you think it’s worth it?”
“For the vape? Probably not. But I need to know how this story ends, even if it’s boring as fuck.” Seokjin leaned back in his chair. “Plus, you get a vape out of it. Meaning I, indirectly, get a vape out of it.”
Jungkook chose not to comment on the last sentence. “Honestly, I don’t really want to go alone.”
“I’ll go with you,” Jimin offered, to which Jungkook immediately replied, “Absolutely the fuck not.”
Seokjin shrugged. “I’ll go.”
Jungkook wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved or even more terrified. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, whatever. We were going to shoot pics on top of the parking garage anyway, right?” Jungkook nodded, and Seokjin shrugged again. “So you can thank me by buying me boba and then we’ll go buy your little death machine.”
“Vaping doesn’t kill,” Jimin pointed out, arms crossed, obviously reeling a bit from being rejected. Seokjin rolled his eyes.
“Whatever. Kook, I’ll pick you up around seven so we make it there by sunset. Jimin, stop pouting. We’ll come home and get plastered after.”
“Cool.” Jungkook stuck one headphone back in his ear. “Now leave me alone, I have to finish this before three.”
Jungkook got out of class at five-thirty that day, after which he returned to the empty apartment, made himself a cup of ramen, and looked for an outfit to wear for his impending quasi-photoshoot.
After becoming a rather popular influencer on social media, he often received free clothes from brands that wanted him to use his following for promotion. The upside to this was two-fold: he got free clothes and, sometimes, an extra stipend from the bigger companies. The downside was that it made choosing outfits for shoots impossible, because he was always faced with the challenge of balancing what he actually wanted to wear with what he should be wearing for advertisement purposes.
Nevertheless, he always managed to make it work. For this particular shoot, he decided on a loose purple tank top that some Urban Outfitter-esque brand whose name he couldn’t remember had sent him several months ago. He was going to just throw on a pair of sweatpants to go with it — a hot-yet-casual look that Jimin would have been so proud of — but then he remembered the guy at the vape shop. Jungkook prayed to every god that he wouldn’t have to interact with him again, but just in case, he opted instead for a pair of black skinny jeans that were unforgivingly tight but made his ass look incredible.
Six minutes after seven o’clock, he heard Seokjin’s car pull up outside. He checked himself in the mirror one last time, made sure he had everything he needed, and sprinted out to the curb. Seokjin whistled lowly as Jungkook slid into the passenger seat.
“Who knew you had an ass?” he teased as he pulled out of the parking lot. Jungkook punched him lightly.
“Gotta post up for the ‘Gram.”
Seokjin wrinkled his nose. “Ew. Don’t speak your disgusting millennial influencer language around me.”
The roof of the downtown parking garage was well-known for its photo ops, but Jungkook had never actually done a shoot there before. The goal was merely to get a few artsy pictures as the sun was setting, enough to make it look like he tried, but not too hard.
Seokjin was a surprisingly good photographer, not least of all because he knew exactly which poses looked best in every lighting. Jungkook barely had to do any work aside from just listening to whatever Seokjin said, and they were done before the sun had even completely disappeared below the horizon.
They sat on the cold concrete of the garage for a bit after, looking through the shots Seokjin had taken.
“Whoa, these are so good,” Jungkook praised, staring at a photo of himself with his back to the camera, pink and gold clouds unfurling before him. “You captured the sky so nicely.”
“Thank you.” Seokjin leaned back on his hands, feigning cockiness. “Maybe I should just become an influencer too. Leave you all in the dust.”
“You literally could.” Jungkook handed him the camera to pack. “You’re handsome, and you take mad good pics.”
Seokjin laughed, standing and slinging the camera bag over his shoulder before helping Jungkook up. “I would, but I can’t take myself that seriously. For example, I’m about to drag you to a vape shop.”
In the moment, Jungkook had almost entirely forgotten about that portion of their plans for the night. He felt fear surge through his veins. “Wait, maybe we shouldn–”
Seokjin placed a finger to Jungkook’s lips, effectively shutting him up. “Honestly, I wasn’t sold on it before, but I have to admit these pictures would actually look so much cooler if you had a cloud of smoke around you, so now we’re doing it.”
“But–”
“Shh.”
“But–”
“Look, do you really not want it? ‘Cause I won’t force you, but you have to tell me the truth.”
Jungkook sighed, which felt a little strange considering Seokjin’s index finger was still pressed against his mouth. “No, I want it.”
“But?” Seokjin prompted, eyebrows raised.
“I’m afraid of the hot dude who works there,” Jungkook mumbled, ashamed. Seokjin crossed his arms.
“Look, I understand, but you’ve got to get over it. You’re hot, too, especially right now, all decked out for this shoot, and you can’t let other people dictate how you live your life.”
Jungkook looked at Seokjin, slightly puzzled. “That’s, like, really good advice for a really stupid situation.”
“You’re welcome. Now come on, you owe me boba.”
The butterflies in Jungkook’s stomach made the thought of consuming anything rather unappealing, but he still purchased an extraordinarily expensive blended Thai tea with rainbow jelly, lychee jelly, and popping boba for Seokjin. Then, they walked next door, Jungkook experiencing a strange sort of deja vu as they reached the very spot on the sidewalk where, one day previously, he had been overwhelmed with courage that had faded away all too quickly.
Suddenly, right before they reached the door, Seokjin stopped dead in his tracks. Jungkook whirled around, eyes wide with a feeling he knew all too well: betrayal.
“Hyung?”
“I’ve brought you this far,” Seokjin said dramatically, boba straw still in his mouth. “The rest is up to you.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Listen you little shit, this is stupid and you know it. Just go in there, buy the goddamn pen, and leave.”
“But the guy –”
“You’re Jeon fucking Jungkook! You have a million followers on Instagram! I didn’t raise you to be this weak!”
“You didn’t raise me at all!”
“Whatever, we’re here now. You can’t run away twice.”
And Jungkook knew he was right. He took a deep breath, said a prayer, sent one last desperate look at Seokjin for good measure, and entered the lion’s den.
Sure enough, the same young man from the previous night was standing behind the counter, looking just as effortlessly attractive as ever and obviously bored out of his mind. He glanced up when Jungkook entered the store, and Jungkook swore he saw some strange emotion flash across his face, but a second later it was gone.
“Can I help you?” the guy asked, and it took every fiber of Jungkook’s being not to fall apart as he responded, “Uh, yeah, I’m looking for a starter kit.”
“Uh-huh.” The dude looked Jungkook up and down, and Jungkook couldn’t tell if he was being checked out or made fun of. “Did you have a specific brand in mind?”
He did. Several weeks prior, he and Jimin had spent an entire day researching different types of vaping mechanisms, and Jungkook knew exactly what he was looking for, down to the serial number. He could, in fact, see the box for it behind the counter, right behind the guy’s perfectly-tousled silver hair. But if nothing else, Jungkook knew how to flirt, and every romantic instinct in his body was telling him to prolong the conversation for as long as he could.
So, rather than flaunting his knowledge, he said, “I mean, I have an idea, but I’m not really sure.”
The guy nodded, finally standing up straight and stretching for a second, exposing a tiny sliver of skin that made Jungkook want to die on the spot.
“Do you want a tank or a pen?” the guy asked, kneeling down to unlock some drawer behind the counter that Jungkook couldn’t see. “Or a pod, I guess, but I don’t really respect people who use pods.” The guy’s head popped up from beneath the counter, and he looked oddly offended at something Jungkook had not even said yet. “You don’t want a Juul, do you? Because that’s just sad.”
“I don’t want a Juul,” Jungkook confirmed. The guy seemed satisfied, ducking back down, out of sight.
“You seem like a pen kind of guy. Am I right?”
“Uh, yeah. Not a tank, preferably.”
“Not a tank,” the guy repeated, and a moment later he popped back up with a stack of boxes in his arms. He laid them all out on the counter. “Alright, take your pick.”
Jungkook scanned the boxes, painfully aware of the guy’s eyes on him. He spotted the model that he and Jimin had decided on, but here, in front of this astronomically attractive employee, he felt the need to drag the decision-making process on for far longer than was necessary.
“What do you use?”
The guy blinked, as though he hadn’t been anticipating the question. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a sleek black pen, holding it out for Jungkook. “It’s this one,” he said, pointing to a box that said “DIGIFLAVOR” on it, which was, in Jungkook’s opinion, a ridiculous name, even among the other ridiculous names by which it was surrounded. The pen was cold and smooth, but if Jungkook was going to buy a vape solely for the potential Instagram clout, it wasn’t going to look so boring and unassuming.
“Have you vaped before?” the guy asked, and Jungkook shook his head.
“I used to smoke cigarettes, but I quit a few months ago.”
“Damn. You smoke for the taste or the vibe?”
“Uh…” Shame burned brightly on Jungkook’s cheeks. “The vibe, honestly.”
The guy snorted, but not in a particularly malicious way. “Well, vape is cleaner than cigs. Same vibe, less lung disease.” The guy gestured vaguely to the pen in Jungkook’s hands. “Take a hit from it, if you want, see if you like it.”
Jungkook looked at him, truly making eye contact with him for the first time. His eyes were deep and sincere and so uncompromisingly alluring, like he was drawing Jungkook closer without even making him move.
It didn’t take much for him to figure out that this offer wasn’t made to just any old dumbass who came waltzing into the store.
“You sure, dude?”
The guy shrugged. “Yeah, I don’t mind.”
Jungkook put the pen in his mouth, pressed the button down, and inhaled, keeping the smoke in his lungs for a moment before breathing it back out. He made a truly valiant effort not to blow smoke in the guy’s face, and for the most part, he was successful.
Tragically, he was unironically pleased with how vaping felt. Maybe it was the renewed presence of nicotine in his system after a few months without it, or maybe it was the fact that whatever flavor the dude had packed in there was really good, but Jungkook was suddenly wholeheartedly dedicated to buying a vape of his own.
“Shit, dude, that’s good ,” he said, handing the pen back to the guy, who flashed a smile that was fifty percent perfect white teeth, fifty percent gums.
“See? It’s the smoothest pen out there. I can get you the same flavor, too, or you can try some others out.”
Jungkook figured that taking an obnoxious amount of time was the perfect way to get revenge on Seokjin, and so he allowed himself to be hustled by the employee who was far more attractive but only slightly less intimidating the more Jungkook talked to him. Eventually, they narrowed it down to the pen that Jungkook had intended to buy in the first place and a flavor that had some stupid name and tasted like the beautiful lovechild of a mango and a strawberry.
As he was ringing Jungkook up, the guy said, “Hey, I’m really glad you decided to come back,” and social anxiety landed a solid punch directly to Jungkook’s gut. Jungkook, who had conducted himself through their entire interaction under the impression that the guy didn’t recognize him, merely smiled sheepishly.
“Ah…I’m a little embarrassed. I thought you wouldn’t remember me.”
The guy smiled, and Jungkook felt his chest tighten in a way that made him want to punch himself in the face.
“It’s all good. I’ll admit I was a little shocked when you came in and, like, immediately left, but I guess I get it.”
Jungkook was almost positive that the guy did not get it, but he was also definitely positive that the guy could “get it” if he wanted to. Nevertheless, Jungkook willed his hormones away and took the bag containing his newest token of shame.
“I panicked at the last second, y’know? Wasn’t ready to get back in it.” It wasn’t a total lie, which was fine by Jungkook’s standards, and the guy nodded understandingly.
“Well, hey, when you run out of juice, swing by and I’ll hook you up.” He handed Jungkook his receipt. “I’m here most weekday evenings. If someone else is out here, just ask for Yoongi.”
“Yoongi,” Jungkook repeated. “Cool. Thanks for the help, man.”
“Yeah, no problem. It’s Jungkook, right?”
Jungkook blinked in slight confusion. “Uh, yeah. Did I…?”
“Nah, it was, uh, on your bank card.” Jungkook swore he saw a tinge of red on Yoongi’s cheeks as he did a poor job of avoiding eye contact with him. “Have a good night.”
“You too, dude.”
With that, Jungkook exited the store, somehow having gained the upper hand in the last thirty seconds of his interaction with Yoongi. He stood on the sidewalk for a moment, briefly attempting to gather his thoughts, when a force so powerful that it could only be Kim Seokjin barreled into his side and trapped him in a headlock.
“You little punk! It’s been fifteen minutes! How long does it take to buy one vape pen?”
“You’re – killing – me,” Jungkook choked out, and Seokjin released him in a rare show of mercy.
“Come, let us debrief in the car.”
Jungkook told him everything as they sat idling in the parking lot, and Seokjin seemed simultaneously amused and impressed.
“Can’t believe your Prince Charming works in a vape shop. That would only happen to you.”
“Hey, shut up. He seems chill.”
“We all seem chill on the outside. Open up the kit, though, let’s see what you got.”
Jungkook did so, taking hold of the smooth new pen that was covered in iridescent designs and filling it with juice the way Yoongi had demonstrated. He raised it to his lips, but Seokjin stopped him before he inhaled.
“This is pic-worthy,” he declared, reaching into the backseat and pulling the camera from its case. “Take a hit and smile your little influencer smile.”
Jungkook did just that, and Seokjin temporarily blinded him with flash as vapor floated around their heads. Seokjin replaced the camera and started the engine, but not before pausing and inhaling deeply.
“What the fuck, that smells so good. Let me try.”
Jungkook handed it over, and Seokjin held it between his lips as he backed out of the parking lot.
“This is the best purchase we’ve ever made,” Jungkook concluded. Seokjin blew a cloud out of the driver-side window.
“Also the stupidest. Now we have to go to the liquor store and make more good-yet-stupid purchases. We promised Jimin a good time.”
They bought four bottles of wine, a handle of vodka, and three bottles of soju. As they approached the register, the cashier said, “I hope this isn’t all for you two,” and Seokjin and Jungkook merely laughed, knowing full well that half of the alcohol would be single-handedly consumed by a certain Park Jimin.
They happened to arrive back at the apartment at the same time as Jimin, who had Hoseok in tow, the two of them obviously having just come back from the dance studio.
“Hey!” Hoseok greeted as soon as he saw them. “Jungkook, I heard about your–”
“Please,” Jungkook interjected, cutting him off. “I’m begging you to not finish that sentence.”
Hoseok shrugged nonchalantly as Jimin stifled laughter, reaching into his pocket to fish out the keys to the apartment.
In less than thirty minutes, the majority of the alcohol was gone. Jungkook remembered nothing after the soju had been opened, and he woke up on the floor of his own living room, late morning sunlight filtering through the windows. The first thing he noticed was the omnipresent smell of mangoes that permeated the air in the apartment. He stood up and stretched, wincing a bit at the dull pain of a hangover headache. Seokjin, Jimin, and Hoseok were an entangled mass of limbs on the couch, and Jungkook couldn’t resist the urge to snap a picture of them; it was a cute image, but it also had significant blackmail potential.
Jungkook padded over to the kitchen, surprised to find Namjoon there, buttering a piece of toast.
“Morning.”
Namjoon glanced over his shoulder. “Oh, you’re up. Good morning.” He turned around, leaning against the counter and taking a bite of toast. “I came home at, like, two in the morning, and you guys were already asleep. Also the place smelled insanely like mangoes. Or strawberries, actually, I couldn’t tell.”
“Yeah, that would be the vape.”
Namjoon raised an eyebrow. “You actually went back?”
Jungkook nodded. “Seokjin made me.”
“Damn.” Namjoon brought his breakfast over to the kitchen table and took a seat, waiting for Jungkook to follow suit before continuing. “How did it go? Was the guy there?”
“Yeah.” Jungkook shrugged “It was fine, though. He’s super chill.”
“Did you flirt with him?” It was slightly accusatory, because Namjoon already knew the answer, but Jungkook smiled cheekily anyway.
“I can’t help it, I flirt with everyone. It’s my charming personality.”
Namjoon rolled his eyes, long-accustomed to Jungkook’s bullshit. “Whatever. Did he flirt back?”
“I’m pretty sure, yeah. He let me try out his vape.” Jungkook mentally played back the events of the previous evening. “And he remembered my name off my bank card after I paid.”
“Shit, Kook. You got yourself a little vape shop Romeo.”
Jungkook felt a blush creeping to his cheeks at the comment, desperate to change the subject. “What were you doing out till two in the morning?”
Namjoon groaned. “Recording. I have this huge project for my digital music class due next week, but I also have three other midterms, so I’m trying to get it done by tomorrow.”
“Oh, fuck.” In all the recent vape shop drama, Jungkook had forgotten that he was still in school, and exam season was nigh. “Midterms are gonna kick my ass.”
“Hey, the vape can help you get through it.”
Just then, Jimin and Hoseok appeared at the entrance to the kitchen, both looking like the personification of death. Wordlessly, Jimin dropped the little silver vape pen in front of Jungkook, then trudged over to the sink to get himself a glass of water. Hoseok collapsed into the seat next to Jungkook, his head hitting the wooden table with a soft thud .
“Alcohol is a societal menace,” he groaned, and Jungkook patted his back reassuringly.
“You’ll be alright, you dramatic bitch.” Then, to Jimin, he asked, “Why did you have the va– I think there’s enough water in that cup.”
The question remained unfinished because Jimin was staring soullessly at the glass in his hand as water from the sink overflowed out of it. As if he were operating in slow motion, he shut the faucet off and took a shaky sip before answering. Jungkook and Namjoon merely watched in silence, similar to how one would watch a documentary about animals in the wild.
“I woke up and had that thing cradled in my arms like a teddy bear,” Jimin reported, glaring menacingly at the vape. “My lungs feel like they’ve been pummeled to death by an MMA fighter.”
“Seconded,” Hoseok agreed, though his voice was muffled due to the fact that his head was still pressed against the table surface. “I don’t remember shit, but my mouth tastes like mangoes and it won’t go away.”
“Huh.” Namjoon had been watching and listening, but Jungkook could tell his curiosity had been piqued. “Let me see it, Jungkook.”
Jungkook handed the pen over to him. Namjoon put it in his mouth and pushed the button, but when he exhaled, there was no smoke. Something in Jungkook’s chest fell, and he was only slightly mad at himself for caring so much about a goddamn vape pen.
“Is it broken?” Jungkook asked, taking it back from Namjoon and inspecting each of its parts. It didn’t take long for him to locate the problem, and when he did, he let out a harsh, “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
Hoseok finally lifted his head and peered over. “What’s up?”
“It’s out of juice.” Jungkook made eye contact with each of them individually. “That was supposed to last a week.”
“What was supposed to last a week?” Seokjin’s voice came from the kitchen entryway, the last to awaken, the effects of a hangover apparently nonexistent.
“Your drunk asses vaped for an entire week last night,” Jungkook accused, and Seokjin merely blinked.
“What…does that mean?”
“I bought a week’s worth of juice,” Jungkook explained, the other four listening intently. “All of that juice is now gone. I bought this goddamn thing to take pictures with, and now I can’t, and also we’re all fucking stupid and we’re gonna contract COPD before we’re thirty.”
“Why don’t you just go buy more from your little boyfriend?” Namjoon asked, obviously holding back a smile. A thousand butterflies erupted in Jungkook’s stomach.
“I can’t go back there for the third night in a row!” he exclaimed, all but throwing the pen down on the table. “He’ll think I’m a dumbass, or a chain smoker, or both.”
“Well, there’s no point in hiding your true self,” Seokjin said with a small shrug. “He might as well find out you’re a dumbass before things get too serious.”
“Things are not serious at all. Things are the opposite of serious. I barely know his name.”
“Then if anything, you should be thanking us,” Hoseok said pointedly. “We’re giving you a chance to take your romance to the next level.”
“Wear those tight-ass jeans again,” Jimin suggested with a grin, “and I’m sure he’ll be happy to see you.”
Jungkook knew he had no other choice. It was a Saturday, and he and Jimin always got their best content on Saturdays, when they had no other obligations and could fit in time to take videos of each other fucking around on skateboards or attempting to do parkour or just generally disturbing the peace. It was the kind of content that basically demanded the presence of a vape.
“Fuck. Fine. Whatever.” He pushed away from the table and stood up, albeit rather dramatically. “I’m going to shower and then I’ll go.”
He was already halfway down the hallway when he heard Hoseok yell, “Wait, I need the bathroom!” to which he yelled back, “You don’t fucking live here!” and then proceeded to intentionally take the longest shower of his life.
He was only a little embarrassed by how long it took him to figure out what to wear before deciding on a black V-neck tee and a plain pair of jeans. As he walked over to the plaza where the vape shop was, he silently prayed that Yoongi wouldn’t be working and Jungkook wouldn’t seem like an incontinent nicotine addict.
When he walked through the door, no one was behind the counter, and hope swelled in Jungkook’s heart. A moment later, a silver head of hair appeared in the doorway, and the hope deflated like a balloon, replaced by mild fear.
“Ran through it already, huh?” Yoongi joked, mirth at the corners of his deep voice. He was wearing a Wu-Tang Clan shirt, hair messy and eyes slightly red in a way that suggested he was either sleep-deprived or high. “I’m a little impressed.”
“It was my friends,” Jungkook said exasperatedly as he approached the counter. “They got wasted last night and smoked everything I had.”
Yoongi looked at him and blinked. “Are they…like…okay?”
“Generally speaking, no. I need a refill, though.”
“’Course you do. You want the same flavor? That mango shit?”
Jungkook shrugged. “Anything else you recommend?”
Yoongi held up a little bottle. “We got this in this morning. Tastes like cupcakes, if you’re into that.”
“Can I try it out?”
“Yeah, no problem. Let me see your pen.”
Jungkook handed it over and watched as Yoongi dropped a tiny bit of the juice in, when suddenly an idea popped into his mind. “You got anything that helps with, like, anxiety?”
Yoongi looked up at him, eyebrows furrowed together. “You ever tried Xanax?”
Jungkook let out a short laugh. “I mean, are there any flavors that are good for that stuff?”
Yoongi thought for a moment, puffing his cheeks out slightly as he did so, an action which made Jungkook want to fling himself into a fire because he was just so goddamn cute.
“I don’t know if this is…like, medically accurate, but people say minty flavors help them chill out.” He began rummaging around in a drawer, but his eyes stayed mostly on Jungkook, evidently still worried. “But dude, if you have anxiety, you should probably talk to a real doctor.”
“No, I have!” Jungkook assured him. “It’s just, like, not bad enough for me to need meds on the regular, but it gets so bad when I have exams and stuff, and I’ve got midterms coming up.”
Yoongi placed another small bottle on the counter, which Jungkook assumed contained the mint juice. “Midterms? You go to the university?”
“Yeah.” It occurred to Jungkook that Yoongi must be a student as well; they were, after all, in a college town, and pretty much everyone who lived there was either a student or a professor. Still, he took the opportunity to ask, “You too?”
Yoongi nodded. “I’m a music production and econ double major.”
“Electrical engineering major, dance performance minor,” Jungkook reported back, and he noticed how Yoongi cringed a little.
“Engineering, huh? That’s gotta be brutal.”
“It is,” Jungkook confirmed, his voice growing a little desperate. “It so is. Like, I don’t know how I’m not insane yet.” Pent-up stress began to surface, and he was unable to stop himself from rambling. “I have a calc exam and a mid-semester showcase for my hip-hop class on the same day, then I have my chem lab midterm the day after, and physics is that same Friday, and I think I’m gonna lose my mind.”
“Hey, you’ll be fine,” Yoongi said immediately, offering a reassuring smile. “I don’t know you that well, but anyone who’s made it this far as an engineering major is probably wicked smart. So it’ll work out.”
Jungkook, oddly enough, did feel a little better. He smiled back. “Thanks. Sorry for rambling, it’s just…between school and photoshoots, it’s all–”
“Whoa, back up,” Yoongi interrupted. “Photoshoots? You model?”
Jungkook instantly regretted everything he’d ever done. He wasn’t in the business of flaunting his influencer status, in part because people tended to change their opinions about him when they found out about it, and also because it was, in a way, kind of embarrassing that he and his best friend took pictures and videos of each other and posted them online in pursuit of fame.
“I don’t really…it’s like…ah, fuck, do you have an Instagram?”
Yoongi shook his head. “I have a Twitter, but I only really follow Nas and Kanye West.”
“God, you sound like a forty-year-old father. Here, look.”
Jungkook ignored the offended look on Yoongi’s face and fished his phone out of his pocket, opening the Instagram app and pulling up his own profile. He flipped the screen around so Yoongi could see.
“People call us influencers,” he explained as he scrolled down his posts, slowly so Yoongi could take it all in. “Brands pay me to promote them and stuff. It’s not real modeling, but it’s pretty fun.”
Yoongi’s expression was scarily unreadable, and Jungkook had to remind himself to breathe. Finally, Yoongi mumbled, “Fuck, this is so cool.”
Relief overwhelmed Jungkook. “Yeah, it’s a pretty good time,” he admitted.
“This is, like, awesome. You have, what, almost a million followers?” He looked at Jungkook, wordlessly asking permission to take the phone and scroll around himself. Jungkook slid it over to him. “And it’s all self-made? That’s edgy as fuck.”
“We’ve been at it for a long time, me and my best friend. That’s him in that pic.”
Yoongi had just scrolled to a picture of Jungkook and Jimin laughing on the hood of Seokjin’s car, back when Jimin had impulsively bleached his hair blonde for a month and insisted they take pictures literally every second. Yoongi scrutinized the post.
“‘chimmy’?” he asked incredulously. “Is that his name?”
“Jimin,” Jungkook corrected, suppressing a laugh. “‘chimmy’ is his username.”
“And you’re,” Yoongi glanced up at the top of the screen, “‘goldenjeon.’ Where does that come from?”
Before Jungkook could respond, a video began playing on the phone, and he heard his own voice floating from the little speakers. “Fuck, wait–”
He reached out to grab the phone before Yoongi could hear him singing, but Yoongi reacted faster, raising the phone up to his ear to hear better, a small smile forming on his face. “You didn’t tell me you can sing, too.”
The sound of his own voice covering an old Justin Bieber song was enough to make Jungkook’s face grow hot. He wanted nothing more than to crawl into a hole and die. “I’m not really good…”
“Shut up, this is incredible.” Yoongi scrolled past the video, and the audio finally stopped. “I mean, I can tell you don’t have formal training, but you’ve definitely got raw talent.” He didn’t give Jungkook a chance to accept the compliment before asking, “Do you have any dance videos on here?”
Jungkook forced himself to overcome his embarrassment, willing away the blush that he knew was turning his cheeks the color of a stewed tomato. “I don’t have any recent vids of us, but Jimin does.” He reached over and navigated to Jimin’s profile. There was a post from a week ago, a video of Jungkook, Jimin, and Hoseok dancing for fun to some EDM song Hoseok was obsessed with. Yoongi watched it loop three times.
“So you sing, you dance, you model, and you engineer,” Yoongi reflected, handing the phone back to Jungkook. “Golden Jeon?”
Jungkook smiled sheepishly. “My friends made it up in high school, back when I made the account. Now I can’t change it because of the brand.”
“Why are you bothering with engineering if you have all that going for you?”
Jungkook shrugged. “It’s something to fall back on, I guess. It’s so hard to make it in entertainment. I’d love to go all the way, but for now they’re just hobbies.”
Yoongi shook his head as though he was in disbelief. “If I were you, I’d say fuck it and just live off my Instagram money.”
Jungkook laughed. “I wish, dude. That’s literally the dream.”
Just then, his phone began to buzz, and Jimin’s photo popped up on the screen. He silenced the call, but realized when he did so that over half an hour had passed and he still had mad shit to do before the day was over.
“Hey, I should probably get going,” he told Yoongi, feeling weirdly sad as he said it. Yoongi seemed to suddenly remember why Jungkook had come to the shop in the first place, and hastily scanned the bottle of mint juice.
“Shit, sorry. I didn’t mean to–”
“No worries,” Jungkook assured as he took the bag with his purchase in it. “It was cool talking to you.”
“Yeah,” Yoongi agreed, flashing another gummy smile. “See you later.”
“Later.”
Jungkook left the shop, discarding the bag and receipt so he could fill up the pen as he walked home. He noticed that the bottle was the smallest size they carried, that it would probably last him less than a week, and he tried to remember if Yoongi had offered up another size. Secretly, he was grateful; he would have an excuse to go back sooner rather than later.
When the pen was full, he pulled out his phone to call Jimin back.
“Where the fuck are you?” Jimin asked angrily through the phone’s speaker.
“Walking home. What’s up?”
“I’m at the food truck festival downtown with Hoseok. The aesthetics are insane, you gotta come down here. We’re gonna try and do a little street performance thing if the cops don’t kick us out, but we need you.”
“Fine. Give me, like, twenty minutes.”
“’Kay. Seokjin left the camera on the kitchen table, can you bring it with you?”
“Anything for you, Jimin,” Jungkook said, faking sincerity. He heard Jimin scoff on the other end.
“Shut up. Bye.”
For once, Jungkook did exactly what Jimin had asked him to do, catching a bus for the fifteen-minute ride downtown. He found Jimin and Hoseok almost as soon as he got there, standing in front of a Thai food truck.
“Guess who got the fucking Starbucks barista’s number,” was the first thing Jimin said upon seeing Jungkook, clearly about to burst with happiness. Jungkook, on the other hand, was in shock, his eyes drifting to the coffee cup in Jimin’s hand.
“I thought he didn’t work weekends?”
“Apparently he’s back,” Hoseok said wearily, an iced coffee in hand. “I genuinely just wanted some coffee, and lo and behold, barista guy was there.”
“I ordered a blonde vanilla latte like I always do, and when he called my name the cup had his name and number on it,” Jimin recounted, practically swooning. “Maybe love is real.”
“How do you know the coffee wasn’t meant for someone else?” Jungkook asked, and Jimin glared at him.
“Because he literally handed it to me, looked me in the eye, and winked. There’s no way it was an accident.” He crossed his arms. “Why can’t you just be happy for me? I support you and vape shop dude.”
“Speaking of which,” Hoseok cut in, “how did that go?”
“Good. Like, weirdly good. We talked for a long time.”
“You’re telling me,” Jimin complained. “Fucking declined my phone call.”
Jungkook shrugged. “I don’t know, he’s cool. I like him.”
Hoseok looked at Jungkook, then Jimin, then back to Jungkook.
“This is the worst,” he decided. “We’re done talking about love until I find my soulmate too. Now let’s go find a spot to be public disturbances.”
Jungkook and Jimin each got a good amount of pictures with the festival in the background. Then, they found an empty enough street corner where they could set up the camera and run through the playlist of songs they had choreographed dances to. Their intention was to get footage for Jimin to post, but they also managed to attract a rather large crowd as they danced, with a few people even dropping money into the snapback Jimin had taken off his head and placed upside-down on the ground in front of them.
It was the last day of freedom Jungkook had before he really had to start worrying about midterms, and he spent the majority of the next week either in the library or in the dance studio, sustaining himself off Red Bull and vape and the occasional bag of chips or cup of ramen.
He posted in his spare time, when he needed mental breaks or was trying to procrastinate on studying, and it turned out Jimin’s “business model” had been effective. The first time he posted a picture that involved a vape, the one Seokjin had taken of him in the car the night he had bought it, he gained thirty-thousand followers almost overnight. He was stunned, but he didn’t have much time to think about it in the midst of studying, and, frustratingly enough, he still hadn’t hit a million followers.
A moment of desperation hit when he ran out of vape juice towards the end of the week, and he knew he would have to take a break from studying and make a run to get more. He made a point of going at night, when he knew Yoongi would be there.
As expected, when he walked in, he was greeted by a familiar gummy smile. The smile, however, almost instantly morphed into a frown.
“Jesus. You look terrible.”
“Nice to see you, too,” Jungkook said with a small smile. Yoongi merely stared at him, undoubtedly taking in the simple black hoodie, the gray sweatpants, the bags that Jungkook knew were sagging under his eyes.
“Exam season really fucks you up, huh?” Yoongi asked, and Jungkook nodded.
“One more week and it’ll all be over,” he said wistfully. “I need a refill, though.”
“You need more than that.” Yoongi looked at Jungkook with an expression he couldn’t quite place. “Do you smoke?”
It took Jungkook a moment to register what Yoongi was saying. “Smoke…weed?”
“Yeah, I mean, unless you smoke something worse.” Yoongi suddenly looked concerned. “You don’t smoke, like, crack or anything, right?”
“No, fuck, no. I’ve smoked, yeah, but I haven’t for a couple of weeks.”
“Alright, well, you look like you could use a bowl. You down?”
Jungkook was torn between accepting Yoongi’s offer or returning to the miniature fort he had built himself in the library. His brain was a jumbled mess of dance moves and multivariable calculus, and he desperately needed a break, so he relented rather easily.
“Yeah, I’m down.”
Yoongi smiled, gesturing for Jungkook to follow him to the back room. Inside were two rolling chairs, a small desk with a laptop perched on top, and what looked like a mattress on the ground. It smelled nice in the way vapor smelled nice after it was exhaled, but there was also the undeniably earthy smell of weed.
“Perks of working in a vape shop,” Yoongi said, closing the door and crossing over to the desk, “the manager doesn’t give a shit and a customer will never judge you no matter how high you are.” He produced a bowl and a few little green buds, grinding them up with his fingers. “But no one besides you ever comes in past ten anyway.”
Jungkook looked around, eyes landing on the little mattress. There was a pillow, a blanket, and even a small teddy bear adorning it.
“Do you sleep in here?”
Yoongi looked at the mattress and smiled. “Yeah. The door chime sounds right down there, so if someone comes in it rings right in your ear. The employees all share it.”
“Cute,” Jungkook said with a small laugh. Yoongi turned and held the bowl out to him along with a lighter.
“Go wild.”
About fifteen minutes and another bowl and a half later, Jungkook was feeling comfortably high. He and Yoongi were facing each other, and the room was only slightly spinning.
“I feel,” Yoongi began, “like the music I make when I’m high is just so much better than when I’m not.”
Jungkook looked at him. “You make music?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah. I rap. Produce my own beats.”
“I didn’t know that.”
Yoongi’s nose scrunched up in thought. Jungkook was completely sure it was the most adorable thing he had ever seen.
“I thought I told you. I don’t know. I feel like I’ve known you forever.”
“Same,” Jungkook agreed, and it was true. At some point, he had stopped being intimidated by Yoongi and found himself wishing for more chances to spend time with him. “I like talking to you.”
Yoongi hummed lowly. “Do you feel less stressed now?”
“Yes. Like, so much less stressed. I needed this.”
It was silent between them for a moment before Yoongi said, “Can I ask you a question?”
“Shoot.”
“Why’d you walk back out the first time you came in here?”
Under sober circumstances, Jungkook may have thought to lie, but it didn’t even cross his mind in his current state. “I thought you were really hot.”
“Oh.” Yoongi’s cheeks turned a light shade of pink. “I, uh…sorry about that.”
“It’s fine. You are, though. I got scared. Embarrassed. I don’t know.”
“For what it’s worth, you’re hot, too,” Yoongi said, and there was something more to it, something suggestive. “I was really happy you came back. And then you came back again and we talked and now you’re back again and…yeah.”
“Yeah,” Jungkook echoed. Maybe it was the weed, but he felt as though he could see the sparks between them, like the tension was a tangible thing that he could reach out and grab and break. It felt like Yoongi was slowly getting closer to him, and he decided that the rapid beating of his heart wasn’t a side effect of the weed.
“We should kiss,” Yoongi said decisively, and it summed up every thought Jungkook’s marijuana-addled brain had been trying to put together.
Jungkook wasn’t sure how it happened. One second there was nothing, and then Yoongi’s lips were against his own, gently at first, then more insistent. Yoongi’s fingers looped through Jungkook’s hair, and Jungkook rested his hands on Yoongi’s bony hips, pulling him down onto his lap and causing the chair to roll backwards slightly. Jungkook felt Yoongi smile at the movement, a soft giggle that he felt on his lips before he actually heard it. Yoongi tasted like weed, like mint gum and the vape he had let Jungkook hit the first night they talked, and like something else Jungkook couldn’t quite place but decided that he loved.
They separated after a few minutes, breathing heavy, hearts pounding. Yoongi hoisted himself off Jungkook’s lap, retrieved a permanent marker from the top drawer of the desk, and grabbed Jungkook’s hand. He rolled up the sleeve of Jungkook’s hoodie and scrawled a phone number in huge handwriting down the length of his forearm.
“I swear to God if you don’t call me,” Yoongi threatened, and he didn’t even have to finish the sentence for his message to be understood. He tossed the marker back to the desk and turned back to Jungkook. “Also, just so we’re clear, I would have done that sober.”
“Ditto,” Jungkook said, a smile playing on his lips.
To be fair, Jungkook texted before he called, but that was because he and Yoongi were both swamped with exams and neither of them had the time to tend to a budding romance until the following week. On Jimin’s insistence, when the week of examination hell was over, they all went out for drinks. It was an opportunity for everyone to properly meet both Yoongi and Jimin’s barista, who they finally found out was named Taehyung and who was only half as weird as Jimin’s fantasies about him had been.
All in all, things went well. Jungkook received endless discounts on his vape refills, and he finally reached a million followers after posting a video of himself singing along to a song Yoongi had composed for him. So maybe, in the end, Jimin’s business model had been flawed. Maybe the vape wasn’t what he had needed after all. Maybe what he had needed was the person who had sold it to him in the first place.